By THIRSTY
Peter Robinson Smith is a Vermont
sculptor with magic in his fingers. He handcrafts each work from wire mesh
using only his fingernails, a scissors and occasionally, a small screw. Smith’s
wire mesh creations, however, are only part of what makes his work extraordinary.
The other part is the shadow that appears when a strong light is aimed at the
sculpture from a particular angle.
STAY THIRSTY: How should people think about and view your
sculptures?
PETER ROBINSON SMITH: While you'll find the sculptures to
be notably interactive, they also represent an entirely new take on
the meaning of “reliefs” or “friezes” perhaps because of their intriguing
translucent/transparent innately attached shadow. Although I don't
pay attention to these shadows when working because they are a subplot to me,
they're not less important to the end results.
This detailed shadow is the result
of an affectation historically known as “cross-hatching” (applied by
artists most associated with charcoal drawings and sketches to their two-dimensional
renderings, though perhaps more popularly known through architects and
their sketched renderings). This is, moreover, a contemporary extension of
an age-old vision (Fibonacci Sequence) based upon all things physical, as
a universal grid, originating from the Hindi. The Italian explorer (Fibonacci)
came in contact with this ancient culture and propagated a related mathematical
equation to this vision of the larger world.
Stay
Thirsty Magazine invites you to watch this video, entitled Pony Creation, as Peter Robinson Smith
creates a pony out of a sheet of wire mesh in just a few minutes. Pure magic.
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